Atrocity in Africa: Children murdered in front of mother!!!!

There is nothing a mother will not do for her infant but even she cannot protect it from bullets. About a year ago, killers attacked a family in central Africa. The surviving witness of the attack told us that the family's guards were completely outgunned. In the end, the mother, riddled with bullets and crying with pain and fear, was left to use her body to shield her baby. Her sacrifice was for naught; the baby was also killed. 
The above is from an article that I will link just below. Unfortunately this atrocity didn't get the media attention that it deserved in no small part because it's become too common in Central Africa. I was outraged and angered beyond belief when I read about it. Murdering a mother and her baby is beyond foul wouldn't you say. The kinds of people who would do such a thing need to be hunted down and either imprisoned for a long period of time or slowly and painfully permanently removed from the planet so that anyone else who would even think of committing such a crime can look at the corpses of those who did carry out this crime and hopefully take the proper and intended object lesson.

I mean how can you just shoot down a mother and her child. Where is your humanity? Why weren't the killers apprehended and tried in court? This needs to be stopped ASAP. I feel every strongly about such things. Don't you? You probably do feel that way having read what I just laid out. Most moral or normal people would. No one or at least no one who's not cartoonishly EVIL likes to read about the killings of a mother and her baby. That link between mother and child is fundamental to mammalian existence. 

But there's a twist here that may change your thoughts. What if I told you that the mother and child who were each murdered were not in fact human but rather elephants? And they were killed not to feed people or because they had threatened or killed humans but because some humans halfway around the world had a sick desire to use ivory for casual trinkets or displays of wealth. Would you say so what and click on another post? Would you think that the death of intelligent animals was worth this? Because I don't. I don't think it's worth it at all. And I think it must be halted. By what right do we kill an animal for fun? Is that something we ought to be doing? Do you think God gave you this right? Does God look kindly on the slaughter and sexual mutilation of creatures He created?

There is nothing a mother elephant will not do for her infant, but even she cannot protect it from bullets. About a year ago, poachers attacked a family of forest elephants in central Africa. The biologist who witnessed the attack told us that wildlife guards were completely outgunned. In the end, an elephant mother, riddled with bullets and trumpeting with pain and fear, was left to use her enormous body to shield her baby. Her sacrifice was for naught; the baby was also killed.

Such is the reality facing African forest elephants today.This mother and child were just two of the tens of thousands of forest elephants that have been butchered over the past decade. A staggering 62 percent vanished from central Africa between 2002 and 2011, according to a study we have just published with 60 other scientists in the journal PLoS One. It was the largest such study ever conducted in the central African forests, where elephants are being poached out of existence for their ivory.

In China and other countries in the Far East, there has been an astronomical rise in the demand for ivory trinkets that, no matter how exquisitely made, have no essential utility whatsoever. An elephant’s tusks have become bling for consumers who have no idea or simply don’t care that it was obtained by inflicting terror, horrendous pain and death on thinking, feeling, self-aware beings.

One of us recently came face to face with this horror while walking through a forest in central Africa. The sickening stench provided the first warning. As the smell grew more pungent, the humming sound of death that surrounds the body of a dead elephant became more pronounced: thousands of buzzing flies, laying eggs and feeding on the corpse. The body was grotesquely cloaked by white, writhing fly maggots; the belly was swollen with the gas of decay. The elephant’s face was a bloody mess, its tusks hacked out with an ax — an atrocity that is often committed while the animal is alive.

LINK

Now I'm from Michigan. Hunting season is huge here. Growing up I spent my summers down South, where hunting was also a cherished pastime. So I understand it. But I don't like it. I've never had interest in shooting something helpless. I take no joy in snuffing out a life. And there is a HUGE moral difference between killing an animal for your own survival or food, or because it's become numerically excessive and killing an animal strictly for fun, killing an animal which is intelligent enough to grieve and killing an animal which is already endangered and flirting with extinction. I think it's savage and immoral beyond words to murder an animal simply so you can have ivory jewelry. I am not a PETA member. But PETA isn't wrong on everything. You don't need to make deliberately offensive comparisons to slavery or the Holocaust to recognize that morally something is deeply wrong when humans kill rare animals for knick knacks. 

Although I do not like hunting and think it often morally problematic, deer in Michigan are a renewable resource. Deer are not being hunted to extinction. There is a department of natural resources which theoretically attempts to manage the deer population and identify and arrest poachers. When stray dogs and cats are taken into shelters and eventually euthanized I'd rather not think about that animal's last moments. But neither dogs nor cats are in danger of extermination. What the Africans and Asians are doing to the elephant species and for that matter the rhino population is something different in both intent and scale. The continuing existence of these species, among others, is at risk. 

Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with the surrounding environment; but you humans do not. You move to an area and you multiply, and multiply, until every natural resource is consumed. The only way for you to survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern... a virus.

I think Agent Smith was on to something. It is is increasingly difficult for 7 billion humans to live in balance with other life forms. What is the moral reason that we have for making distinctions between humans and animals? I'm no longer sure there is one. Perhaps if someone were hunting the poachers and their customers, they might understand that killing living creatures for fun isn't really a nice thing to do.

China, similarly to the US and maybe even more so, has some very ugly cultural traits. These were tolerable perhaps when China was poor and limited in its impact. But with China's increasing wealth and power there will be more conflict between China and everyone else over the world's natural resources and various flora and fauna. Just like with carbon emissions, the world may not be able to survive an unhinged and unchecked Chinese demand for natural resources. China has a lot to answer for and must play a more responsible role in future resource utilization. We can not  remove China as a player no matter how much that might help save the elephants so we must find a way to  force China, help China to alter its behavior, even as we change our own.

You would think that since in historical terms, African nations have only recently thrown off the chains of centuries long European resource exploitation via colonialism and imperialism, African nations would be a bit more wary of entering into more or less the same relationship with China. Unfortunately this isn't always the case.

In 30 years of fighting poachers, Paul Onyango had never seen anything like this. Twenty-two dead elephants, including several very young ones, clumped together on the open savanna, many killed by a single bullet to the top of the head.

Some of Africa’s most notorious armed groups, including the Lord’s Resistance Army, the Shabab and Darfur’s janjaweed, are hunting down elephants and using the tusks to buy weapons and sustain their mayhem. Organized crime syndicates are linking up with them to move the ivory around the world, exploiting turbulent states, porous borders and corrupt officials from sub-Saharan Africa to China, law enforcement officials say. 

But it is not just outlaws cashing in. Members of some of the African armies that the American government trains and supports with millions of taxpayer dollars — like the Ugandan military, the Congolese Army and newly independent South Sudan’s military — have been implicated in poaching elephants and dealing in ivory. Congolese soldiers are often arrested for it. South Sudanese forces frequently battle wildlife rangers. 

The vast majority of the illegal ivory — experts say as much as 70 percent — is flowing to China, and though the Chinese have coveted ivory for centuries, never before have so many of them been able to afford it. China’s economic boom has created a vast middle class, pushing the price of ivory to a stratospheric $1,000 per pound on the streets of Beijing. 

High-ranking officers in the People’s Liberation Army have a fondness for ivory trinkets as gifts. Chinese online forums offer a thriving, and essentially unregulated, market for ivory chopsticks, bookmarks, rings, cups and combs, along with helpful tips on how to smuggle them (wrap the ivory in tinfoil, says one Web site, to throw off X-ray machines).Last year, more than 150 Chinese citizens were arrested across Africa, from Kenya to Nigeria, for smuggling ivory. And there is growing evidence that poaching increases in elephant-rich areas where Chinese construction workers are building roads. 

“China is the epicenter of demand,” said Robert Hormats, a senior State Department official. “Without the demand from China, this would all but dry up.”He said that Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, who condemned conflict minerals from Congo a few years ago, was pushing the ivory issue with the Chinese “at the highest levels” and that she was “going to spend a considerable amount of time and effort to address this, in a very bold way.” Foreigners have been decimating African elephants for generations. “White gold” was one of the primary reasons King Leopold II of Belgium turned Congo into his own personal fief in the late 19th century, leading to the brutal excesses of the upriver ivory stations thinly fictionalized in Joseph Conrad’s novel “Heart of Darkness” and planting the seeds for Congo’s free fall today. Ivory Coast got its name from the teeming elephant herds that used to frolic in its forests. Today, after decades of carnage, there is almost no ivory left...

LINK
Now why does this matter? It matters because elephants are rare, intelligent animals. Killing them for trinkets is profoundly morally depraved and filthy. It also matters because removing elephants from the ecosystem may have unforeseen effects. Fewer or extinct elephants means fewer forests means higher carbon emissions means greater climate change. And when that occurs some of the same nations engaged in or underwriting this slaughter will be making pious UN speeches blaming the US for climate change and begging demanding more money. It matters because we simply cannot stand by and allow an atavistic Chinese and East Asian desire for ivory wipe out an entire species. And finally it matters because the violence and corruption endemic in poaching inevitably and literally bleeds out into African societies. How can you have a lawful or peaceful society when well armed criminal organizations or corrupt armies and police feel free to ignore the law and kill those who try to uphold it? How can Africa grow and thrive if it continues to serve primarily if not solely as a natural resource provider to The West and increasingly to China? 

It can't. It won't.

For short term profit, Africans will slaughter the wild animals that live in their countries. Three decades from now when the animals are all gone those countries will probably still be impoverished. If you're interested in getting more information and learning what you can do to help combat this disgusting slaughter please visit these sites.
http://www.cites.org/
http://www.bloodyivory.org/stop-the-ivory-trade
http://www.stoprhinopoaching.com/register.aspx
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2013/mar/06/ivory-poaching-sanctions-cites?CMP=twt_gu

Rutgers Basketball Coach Mike Rice Fired!!!

It's important for each coach to be able to run his team as he sees fit. Some coaches are easier to get along with than others. Some coaches are famously intolerant of the slightest mistakes while others are more soft-spoken and try to teach via example instead of humiliation. Still, unless a coach happens to have recently won a national title or be related to or have embarrassing pictures of the Athletic Director and/or university President or Regents, there is usually some consistent pressure to "get things done".  Nobody has time for hurt feelings or thin skin. Results count.

This can make coaches act in disturbing ways and do things they might not have done if they knew the public would get a look at them. On the other hand, coaches are also supposed to teach character and leadership. And I was always taught that character is revealed by how you act when there is no one else around to see you or how you treat people over whom you have power. By those standards, Rutgers' basketball coach Mike Rice failed. Rutgers is joining the Big Ten next year. Rice was fired because of this video (and others) and the words and actions he displayed within. I could never allow any man not my father or a police officer exercising a lawful warrant to lay his hands on me without retribution but that's just me.

What do you think?

 

HBO Game of Thrones Recap : Valar Dohaeris

And here we go. We open in darkness and storm beyond the wall. I have mentioned before how amusing I find it that Sam's brethren booked up and split leaving him to face the White Walkers and walking dead on his own. Sam finds a dead Night's Watch's man who been decapitated. Sam is attacked by a zombie. But Ghost is there to pull the zombie off Sam. The rest of the Night's Watch, led by Lord Commander Mormont, make quick work of the zombie. The Commander wants to know if Sam sent word out and is disgusted to find out that he didn't. Now everyone has to go back to the Wall.

Along with the Lord of Bones aka Rattleshirt, Ygritte cheerfully leads Jon Snow thru the wildling camp. Not everyone is happy to see a Night's Watch member. Jon sees that there are giants in the wildling camp. They arrive at Mance Rayder's tent where Jon mistakes Tormund Giantsbane for Mance and bows to him. This breaks the ice a bit and Mance reveals himself telling Jon that kneeling is not required. However he still wants to know why Jon is switching sides. And after dismissing Jon's first answer it's subtly shown that Mance will kill Jon if he's not convinced of Jon's sincerity. Well the best lies always have some truth mixed in them. Jon shares his anger at Craster's incest and sacrifice to the White Walkers and the Lord Commander's refusal to do anything about it. He says that's what led him to leave. Well that's good enough for Mance and he accepts Jon for now. He's also noticed that Jon and Ygritte are making puppy eyes at each other.

In King's Landing Bronn is in a brothel trying to do what all soldiers with time on their hands and a willing woman do but he's interrupted by Tyrion's squire Podrick who tells Bronn that Tyrion wants him right now and won't take no for an answer. Cersei comes to visit her brother who is of course suspicious of her intentions. Cersei wants to know why Tyrion wants to see their father and if he's gonna be tattling on her. Tyrion reminds her of long ago cruelties but all Cersei can remember is that Tyrion told on her. Cersei has trouble hiding her amusement at the turn of events in Tyrion's life. Bronn arrives and engages in some macho insults with Ser Meryn Trant, pointing out that Trant isn't good for much besides beating up Sansa. Violence is averted when Cersei leaves. Bronn tells Tyrion he wants double the money he's been getting, whatever that is.

Davos is alive! He's been burned. He's picked up by boats belonging to his old friend Salladhor Saan. Salladhor is quite embittered by the loss and worried by Stannis' depression and habit of burning alive those that he (or Melisandre) thinks are heretics. Davos begs and calls in every chip he has to convince Salladhor to take him to Dragonstone.  Once he gets there Stannis doesn't appear to be too happy to see him. He's like whatever. Stannis won't send Melisandre away so that they can talk in private. Davos chides Melisandre and Stannis for their executions. Melisandre (and is that some nice cleavage or what) blames Davos for convincing Stannis not to take her to the battle. When she talks about Davos' son's death Davos loses it and tries to kill her but is stopped and imprisoned. 

Roose Bolton and Robb and northern forces arrive at Harrenhal to find it abandoned and several Stark and Tully POW's and Harrenhal staff killed. This was likely the work of The Mountain. Robb is still po'd at his mother for letting Jaime Lannister go and it seems that his men are as well. They find one survivor, a maester named Qyburn.

Tyrion finally gets in to see his Daddy who is busy writing letters and doesn't appear to wish to be bothered. After Tyrion's pitiful attempts at small talk fail Tywin abruptly asks him what does he want. Tyrion points out all the good deeds he did and says a little credit/gratitude might be a start. Tywin scoffs and said he heard about all the fun Tyrion was having with prostitutes after specifically being told to stop that. Tywin also says that whatever good Tyrion did that's what he was supposed to do and he gets no extra credit for that. Tyrion gathers his nerves and says that since Jaime can't legally inherit that he should get Casterly Rock. Tywin can't believe this. He says he might try to give Tyrion a slightly better position and arrange a reasonable marriage for a dwarf but there's no way in hell he's ever getting Casterly Rock. Almost all of this dialogue is taken directly from the book and is probably the most powerful scene this week. Tywin goes OFF on Tyrion. Tywin kicks him out, tells him not to ask about Casterly Rock again and to stay away from prostitutes unless he wants Tywin to kill them. You can see that Tyrion is really hurt. It's not just about Casterly Rock of course. It's about seeking love and recognition from an emotional abuser. 

In King's Landing Sansa and Shae watch ships leaving and make up stories about where they are going. Littlefinger shows up to talk with Sansa (looking and sounding EXACTLY like someone from To Catch A Predator) and tells Sansa he MIGHT be able to get her home. He also says he saw Catelyn and Arya. Roz tells Shae to watch over Sansa and watch out for Littlefinger.

Staying in King's Landing there is a nice contrast between Joffrey and Margarey. Both are being carried in litters. Joffrey hates the stink and is grimacing, with a handkerchief to his nose. Margarey gets out of her litter and visits a religious orphanage bringing cheer, food, and toys. She tells the head of the orphanage to come to her directly if she ever needs help. Later that night there is a dinner that includes Margarey, Joffrey, Loras and Cersei. Both of the Tyrells remain softspoken but Cersei is in a bad mood. She makes fun of Margarey's revealing outfit and Margarey politely does the same to Cersei's severe masculine one. Before a full blown catfight can develop tensions erupt between Joffrey and Cersei. It also comes out that House Tyrell is now supplying most of the food in King's Landing. 

There is a great shot of Daenerys and her followers aboard a ship bound to Astapor. Her dragons are much larger, about as big as a midsize dog. They hunt for fish. They are still not large enough to use in military applications. Danerys needs an army and intends to get one in Astapor. Astapor is a slave city. Once Daenerys arrives in Astapor the wealthy slaver Kraznys, bursting with financial, ethnic and sexual contempt for Daenerys, explains thru his slave translator Missandei (and this woman is wearing yet another high cleavage quotient outfit) that The Unsullied are slave soldiers who have been trained since birth by very brutal and evil methods to follow orders and fight no matter the odds or pain. To prove this point he slices off the nipple of an Unsullied man who makes no protest or cry of pain. Danerys doesn't know about the morality of buying slaves, even if she intends to free them. Jorah is uncertain of their fighting prowess as after all they have all been castrated. But before they can discuss it further Daenerys is distracted by a child playing with a globe. She lets the child get too close and the globe is shown to contain some sort of magical insect or scorpion. The warlocks of Qarth have sent an assassin. But her life is saved by Ser Barristan Selmy, who having been forced out of Joffrey's service, is eager to enter hers.

*This post is written for discussion of this episode and previous episodes. If you have book based knowledge of future events please be kind enough not to discuss that here. Most of my blog partners have not read the books and would take spoilers most unkindly. Heads, spikes, well you get the idea....

Book Reviews-Pardon Me, You're Stepping On My Eyeball, Blood on The Leaves

Pardon Me, You're Stepping on My Eyeball
by Paul Zindel

As I mentioned in the review of Zindel's book The Pigman, Paul Zindel was an author who primarily wrote for young adults, but really didn't write down to them. Although his characters didn't always have mortgages, resentful ex-spouses, demanding bosses, ungrateful kids or more typical adult concerns, the books generally have characters, who despite not being adults do have concerns that adults often have- whether or not they're having sex, if they're normal or not, the relationships they have with their family and friends, and how much they hate their obligations, which instead of being paid work is usually school and doing what their parents tell them.
So you probably shouldn't be put off by the young ages of the main characters. It doesn't really matter. On the surface this has some similarities to The Pigman. There's two teenage misfits, a houseparty that goes drastically wrong and some quirky kids and bullies but that's pretty minor. It's a much darker tale and one that surprised me in some ways. There's very real anger and even some ugly domestic abuse that came out of left field. If this book was being written today that last would almost certainly be handled differently. I hope so at least.

This book tells the tale of two high school weirdos and their encounters with each other, their dysfunctional families and their struggles to move forward in life. It's dramatically not a love story although there are some hints of that. Both the hero and heroine are in a special needs class.

Louis Mellow, or as he prefers to be called, Marsh, is an intelligent high school student who spends his days writing down lists of all the things he hates and why he hates them. He idealizes his absent father, whom he calls Paranoid Pete and hates his whiny mean drunk mother, whom he refers to as Schizoid Suzy. Marsh always carries a baby raccoon that he rescued in his jacket pocket.  Marsh can be quite disruptive in class. He enjoys telling people outrageous stories about his adventures with his father and their supposed lecherous dalliances with women and girls all over the continental United States and beyond. According to Marsh Paranoid Pete is locked in an insane asylum and about to be executed! Marsh doesn't tell this part to most people and can be cruelly dismissive or insulting to anyone who doesn't believe his stories. 

Edna Shinglebox is a girl at Marsh's school that Marsh decides he likes, just because anyone who has the nerve to walk around with a name like Shinglebox must have some heart. Edna actually suffers from social anxiety and gawkiness. Her hair gets caught in escalators and she makes involuntary head jerks when she gets nervous, which is often. Her parents think she's going to die an old maid. Her mother is extremely sarcastic and cutting. Her mother is trying to fix Edna up with anything of the male persuasion, weird or not. Marsh wants Edna's help to rescue his father. Edna's not sure if she likes Marsh but after he insults her a few times she finds the backbone to stand up to him and change how she approaches life in general. She also rather quickly figures out the truth behind Marsh's stories and must decide if she wants to help. I can't say for sure of course but from the outside looking in I would think that Zindel wrote an extremely realistic young girl character. The common humanity that we all share shines through.

Everyone has problems here, whether it's the overweight diabetic teacher who also knows why Marsh has issues and refuses to tell Edna or the rich girl who knows that the football player only likes her because she lives in a large house suitable for parties, or the malodorous psychic who wants to give Edna advice. The ending is at best bittersweet but also leaves room for growth, which is all you can ask for in life. Worthwhile reading. Edna's anger is awesome to see. This is also a very funny book. The title comes from the advice Marsh got from his father to not let anyone step on his eyeball.





Blood On The Leaves
By Jeff Stetson

Is justice delayed justice denied? Honestly what do you feel when you read about a 85-90 year old man being arrested and charged with war crimes for what he supposedly did in World War Two? Do you think the soldiers in the Mahmudiyah  or My Lai rapes and massacres got off easy? Does someone today have the right to hold someone accountable for what they did 50 years ago? What do you think when you read about someone suing an insurance firm or art gallery for actions they allegedly took during the Holocaust? Often people's feelings about this depend on whether they are the party seeking justice or the party with something concrete to lose, whether it be money, liberty or life. That's just human nature. 

One thing that is unfortunately true is that there were and are a great many people walking around, primarily but not exclusively in the South, who enforced segregation not reluctantly but with relish. And some of these people used violence to do so whether under color of law or on their own, albeit with the silent assent of a great many racist whites. Many of these people were never brought to justice and likely never will be. The FBI is closing the books on several of these cases. And let's be honest, for years the FBI did not consider these cases to be major priorities anyway.

But imagine if there were someone who felt that there was a debt that must be paid, no matter how much time had passed or whether the criminal had started a family and moderated his views. This is the premise of Blood on the Leaves, a book of fiction that is much a mystery and action set-piece as it is an essay of what true justice means. 

In Mississippi a number of elderly unrepentant white racists who were suspected or acquitted of killing Black protesters or citizens during the civil rights movement are all winding up dead often in the same way that their victims did. A black professor, Martin Matheson, just happens to be giving lectures on various people that escaped conviction for their crimes during the sixties and seventies. He gets national attention. Matheson includes graphic photos of their victims along with pictures, names and current addresses and phone numbers of the perpetrators. The powers that be try to shut this project down but nothing stops Matheson for long. Nothing that is until there is some physical evidence linking Matheson to one of the murders. Matheson will be prosecuted by Mississippi's only black deputy district attorney, James Reynolds, who both understands and resents his role here. Matheson will be defended by Todd Miller, an old school white liberal with his own demons to exorcise. This is a surprisingly good courtroom drama with the requisite number of twists and turns. This was Stetson's first novel. At one point this was going to be made into a movie starring Jaime Foxx. I don't know if that's still a possibility.

HBO Game of Thrones: Season Two Recap and Season Three Anticipation

HBO Game of Thrones Recap-Season Two

Another year has come and gone. Hopefully you're a little bit wiser, a little bit wealthier and ready to watch the 9 PM Sunday premiere of HBO's Season 3 of Game of Thrones. If you don't watch the show and are curious all I can say is that the show combines a feeling of The Sopranos meets The Wire in Middle Earth with a very strong Shakespearean/Dickensian/Dune overlay. There are scores of characters. The good guys don't always win and your view of who the good guys are may change dramatically over time. There are fantastical elements (walking dead, clairvoyance, ice demons, dragons, scarily intelligent and huge guardian direwolves which reflect and anticipate their human partner's emotions) but the magical elements don't dominate the story though they will become more important later. No this story is really about the ugliness and glory of humanity. 

A war of succession, called the War of Five Kings, has broken out on a continent quite similar to Europe at the Middle Ages and Renaissance level of development. A Lannister King unjustly executed the head of House Stark so Houses Stark and Tully (they're in-laws) have risen in revolt. House Baratheon claims (correctly) that the Lannister king is a product of incest and thus has no right to the throne. It also launched a war against the Lannisters. House Tyrell once supported the younger rebel Renly Baratheon but when the elder Baratheon brother Stannis had his brother Renly murdered, the Tyrells threw in with the Lannisters. The Arryns and Martells are staying out of the war. House Greyjoy spurned an alliance from House Stark and attacked House Stark, for whom it holds a special disdain. Across the sea, House Targaryen, recently deposed and thought virtually powerless is reconstituting itself around the leadership of a teen girl, the last Targaryen. She has dragons. She thinks herself the rightful Queen. Unknown to everyone, powers in the North are stirring. Both the wildling hordes and the more dangerous White Walkers intend to invade the realms of Westeros. They are opposed only by a ragtag bunch of outcasts, criminals and disinherited sons known as the Night Watch.

As of the end of Season Two this is where some of the major characters found themselves.


Robb and Catelyn Stark

As the eldest son and wife of murdered Ned Stark, it's safe to say that these two took Ned's death as hard as anyone, maybe harder. Both had thoughts that immediately turned to bloody vengeance. Robb gathered an army, challenged any doubters to come and have a go if they thought they were hard enough, and proceeded to kick Lannister behind up and down Westeros. He's known as The Young Wolf, which is a pretty cool nickname if you think about it. Despite usually being greatly outnumbered, Robb has defeated every Lannister army he's faced. He's made Tywin Lannister, the top general and leader of House Lannister, look like a tired old man. Rumble young man rumble!!!  But no one's perfect. Robb thought that Theon Greyjoy was his friend and sent him to parley with his father Balon Greyjoy. But Balon Greyjoy had already decided to attack the North. Feeling threatened by his father's preference for his sister Yara, Theon decided to prove himself to his family by attacking and taking Winterfell, the Stark home. He also killed two children and claimed that he had killed Robb's younger brothers. Winterfell could not be held though and Theon's men turned on him. Winterfell was burned and its people slaughtered.

Catelyn gave Robb advice and tried to broker a peace between the feuding Baratheon brothers. This didn't work and Catelyn had to escape with Brienne, a supporter of the late Renly Baratheon and Westeros' only female knight. Brienne swore loyalty to Catelyn Stark, and NOT the Starks in general. This came in handy when Catelyn, worried about the safety of her daughters, Sansa and Arya, in Lannister captivity, released Jaime Lannister, Tywin's favorite son, into Brienne's custody with orders to trade Jaime for her daughters. This didn't go over very well with Robb or his followers.  Catelyn fretted about Robb's marriage to Talisa, a foreign nurse he met. Robb was supposed to marry the daughter of Walder Frey, a bannerman to Catelyn's father. Frey has been supporting Robb's war. Robb put Catelyn under house arrest and sent men to retrieve Jaime and Brienne. But Brienne showed she's no slouch in the warrior department, killing three Stark soldiers with ease. Jaime Lannister is likely the realm's most dangerous swordsman. He can't believe that a woman, especially one as ugly as Brienne, can do the things he does. He spends his days thinking up new insults to call Brienne. 



Arya Stark

Everyone's favorite left-handed action girl, Arya Stark avoided the bloodbath in King's Landing when her father Ned was captured and executed. She left with Yoren, a rough Night's Watch recruiter who swore to take her home. But Yoren's group was attacked by Lannister troops looking for Gendry, King Robert's illegitimate son. Yoren was killed. Arya and her friends were taken into custody. Arya was taken to Harrenhal (for obvious reasons she did not disclose her identity). At Harrenhal Arya ran into the mysterious man named Jaqen H'ghar, whom she had previously saved from a burning wagon. The strange man with the odd diction told Arya that he owed her three lives. She used him to kill two of the people who hurt her or her friends but before she could use him on Tywin Lannister and possibly change the war's outcome, Twyin left for King's Landing. Arya convinced H'ghar to help her, Gendry and Hot Pie to escape. He did this by somehow killing a multitude of guards simultaneously and silently. He then altered his features and told Arya that if she wanted to learn his skills, come with him to Braavos. For now, Arya declined, being eager to rejoin her family. Arya witnessed a fair deal of torture, murder and brutality and believe it or not this was actually toned down somewhat from the books. She also got to match wits with Tywin Lannister.




Bran and Rickon Stark
They have hidden in the crypts with loyalists Hodor, Osha and their two wolves. They have thus survived the burning of Winterfell and are heading North. Bran is still having strange dreams that seem to hint at future events and make it seem as if he is seeing things through the eyes of his wolf, Summer. Both of the younger Stark boys are having to grow up much faster than they should. 




Tyrion Lannister, Cersei Lannister and Stannis Baratheon 

Reluctantly given Hand authority by his father Twyin with orders not to let Cersei or Joffrey muck things up any worse than they already had, Tyrion saw highs and lows in Season Two. Despised and mocked by everyone for being a dwarf, Tyrion showed real leadership ability and even fearlessness in limiting Joffrey's abuses, publicly correcting Joffrey, trying to eliminate the more openly venal administrators around him and successfully defending King's Landing against the Stannis Baratheon onslaught. Unfortunately someone on his own side tried to have him murdered during battle. Although his squire saved his life, Tyrion awoke from his recovery to find that his authority was gone. Tywin was in charge now. Tyrion was once again out of favor.

Cersei Lannister kidnapped and abused the woman who she thought was Tyrion's paramour. She may or may not have given the order to kill her brother. She was on the verge of murdering her son Tommen, believing all was lost, when her father saved the day. Cersei had a strange relationship with Sansa Stark, despising her and bullying her but occasionally giving her what she saw as useful or realistic advice about being a woman.

Stannis Baratheon, despite seeing much of his fleet destroyed by Tyrion's ingenious use of wildfire (napalm) was in the front lines serving up butt-kickings, Baratheon style, to the Lannister soldiers. He was on the verge of victory when he was attacked from behind by the combined Lannister/Tyrell soldiery and forced to retreat. Back at Dragonstone the depressed Stannis demanded to know why he had lost but was shown a vision in fire by his sexy and profoundly weird religious advisor Melisandre which seems to have mollified him somewhat. If there's one thing we know about Stannis though, it's that he does not quit. Ever. 



Sansa Stark and Joffrey Lannister

Sansa Stark spent most of Season Two being Joffrey's outlet for frustration over the fact that Robb Stark was beating Lannister armies like rented mules. Joffrey is more interested in hurting and humiliating women than in having sex with them and regularly had the teenage Sansa beaten and stripped by grown men. Tyrion Lannister was the only man who stopped this. But the fearsome Lannister bodyguard The Hound, never beat Sansa, subtly attempted to protect her from Joffrey and rescued her from a would be gang-rape. Sansa is on the verge of womanhood. She might have been able to tell that the Hound didn't do those things because he's a nice guy. The Hound is most emphatically NOT a nice guy. Despite this, Sansa refused to leave with the Hound when he quit Lannister service and offered to take her home. This decision looked wise when Joffrey renounced his betrothal to Sansa in favor of Margaery Tyrell. But as the shifty Littlefinger explained to Sansa, this doesn't mean that Joffrey has given up interest in Sansa. Without the title of wife to protect her she may be in even worse danger.

Joffrey Lannister continued to be the Lannister we hate the most. When he wasn't mutilating bards for fun, murdering his putative half-siblings, or ordering massacres because peasants laughed at him, he was beating and insulting Sansa Stark. When that outlet was temporarily denied him he transferred his psychosis to prostitutes. When war came he talked a good game but when stuff got real he ran home to his mother and left the leadership to Tyrion. Season Two saw a realization on both Joffrey's and Cersei's parts that Joffrey was truly dangerous and had no qualms about hurting anyone. Varys and Littlefinger continue to plot from the shadows.



Daenerys Targaryen 

The would be queen of Westeros didn't have much of an arc in Season Two. That will likely change in Season Three. In Season Two her dragons were small and more exotic playthings than dangerous pets. Danerys and her retinue spent all season in Quarth, a democratic city run by a council of merchants. Those merchants were intrigued by the dragons but had zero interest in backing Danerys' longshot to retake the Iron Throne. One merchant, Xaro pretended romantic interest in Danerys and claimed wealth. But he, along with the wizard Pyat Pree really just wanted the dragons. Pyat Pree made the critical mistake of forgetting that any dragon is more loyal to its owner/trainer than to the weird looking guy who dragon-napped it. After Danerys had Pree burned alive she discovered the treachery (and penury) of Xaro and had her remaining loyalists lock Xaro and his lover in his empty vault. And her friend who would be more, Jorah Mormont still hasn't made his move. Better go for it in Season Three, Jorah. Faint heart, fair lady, you know the rest.



Jon Snow

Jon Snow joined the Night Watch because he thought it was an honorable thing to do and because he wanted to get away from Catelyn Stark, who hated him. Well he jumped out of the frying pan and into the fire. Not only has Jon learned that many of the Night Watch men are hoodlums, thieves, exiles and all around bad guys but that Night Watch leaders must make deals with even worse people for information. One such man is Craster, a man who gives information and food to Night Watch members. In return they turn a blind eye to Craster's rape of his daughters and granddaughters and sacrificing of male relatives to the White Walkers. Jon spoke out of school about this and gets the Night Watch team kicked out of Craster's home. He also got a beatdown from Craster. Heading further north Jon joined with a small group of Night Watch rangers who intended to infiltrate the wildling army and assassinate the wildling king Mance Rayder. But the mission went wrong when Jon gets lost and confused by his raunchy redheaded wildling captive, the beautiful and loud mouthed Ygritte who leads him into a trap. Trying to save the mission, Qhorin Halfhand, the ranger leader manipulated Jon into killing him. Now slightly trusted, Jon is taken to meet the wilding king. Jon's best bud Sam, witnessed what looked like a full scale southern march of White Walkers and the walking dead.

I was just recently part of an E! Entertainment circle discussion and interview about Season Three. Spoilers were avoided as much as possible and you know my policy about spoilers here. I can say that the creators have publicly stated that this is the season they were hoping to reach. I can also say that Season Three will continue deviations from the books. In any event I'm really looking forward to this season. There will be tons of new characters introduced. Blink and you'll miss something important. This is HBO's flagship show and in my opinion one of the better shows on television. Of course I don't watch much television so take that with a ROCK of salt. Enjoy the trailers below.


TRAILER    THE BEAST TRAILER

EXTENDED TRAILER  ALL OF US TRAILER

ENEMIES TRAILER  Game of Thrones Pickup Lines (Mildly adult humor)

RAINS TRAILER

*This post is written for discussion of season two and unspoiled anticipation of season three.  If you have book based knowledge of future events please be kind enough not to discuss that here. Most of my blog partners have not read the books and would take spoilers most unkindly. Heads, spikes, well you get the idea. Don't be THAT guy.

HBO Game of Thrones: Stark and Lannister

As we countdown to Season 3 of HBO's Game of Thrones I thought it might be fun each Sunday to share some quick reminders/background info on which ruling Houses are involved in war, what power they have or had and how they relate to one another. Obviously I intend to do this without spoiler information and hope that any reader who's familiar with the books will honor that as well. Otherwise I'll just have to cut off their heads. Personally. Because the man that passes the sentence should swing the sword. =) Hopefully, if you watch the show once the new season starts and all the names start to fly back and forth, this might help you recall who's who.

House Stark

The Starks are the first Great House of Westeros introduced in both the HBO show and the books. In the books they get most of the initial POV. This could have the effect of making the reader or viewer identify with the Starks. I certainly did and still do. Although the Starks are unelected nobles they appear, against all modern logic to be the "good" or "nice" nobles. Well as you know, things aren't always as they seem. Legends claim it was a Stark Night Watch commander who married a White Walker woman and then committed various atrocities before being defeated by the combined might of the Starks and Wildlings.
The Starks are rulers of The North, a region which is roughly half of all Westeros and is thus about as big as all the other realms combined. In culture and attitude the North is similar to real life medieval Scotland or Northumbria while in terms of size and weather it is like Canada or Russia. The North often has very long harsh winters. It's not densely populated or super wealthy. Much of The North's economy is based on frantically trying to produce just enough food to survive winter. Men and women are judged less on what they say and more on what they do. Northerners often have the prejudice that they're more plain spoken and virile than Southerners. Oaths are important throughout Westeros but are virtually sacrosanct in The North.

Although there is no class or gender equality, or democracy, The North in general and the Starks in particular appear to have less use for the complex Southern social hierarchies. Eddard Stark often sought advice from people of various classes. Eddard, and many of his ancestors, had a long history of treating people firmly but fairly. Good or bad, you always know where you stand with a Stark. House Stark and its vassals can't produce quite the number of soldiers that some other Houses can but they can rely on extreme personal loyalty in times of trouble thanks to past altruistic or honorable actions House Stark took. Starks can be very prickly about matters of honor and will often act in ways that confuse or infuriate others when honor is at stake.

Most Northerners, including the Starks, share little culturally/ethnically/religiously with the South and the Andal, Targaryen or Rhoynar descended people. They share much more with the First Men (Celtic analogues), many of whom's descendants are now derisively called "wildlings" and kept beyond the Wall. The North keeps to the old ways and The Old Gods. There are fewer Northern knights as knighthood is associated with the faith of The Seven. The Starks ruled as The Kings of Winter/Kings In the North for thousands of years before they bent the knee to the Targaryen invaders. The Starks probably have the oldest ruling line in all the Seven Kingdoms. Traditionally the Starks had few links to the South. Ned's father wanted to rectify that by having Ned's brother Brandon marry Catelyn Tully and Ned's sister Lyanna marry Robert Baratheon, Ned's best friend and ward-brother. As you know that didn't work out as planned when Brandon Stark stormed the Red Keep calling for Rhaegar Targaryen to come out and die.

The Starks boast descent from Bran The Builder, the legendary first King of Winter who 8000 years ago built Winterfell, Storm's End and The Wall, and established the Night Watch. He did all this after the Long Night, a period of night and winter that lasted a generation when the Others invaded the lands of the living.

Because The North in general and the Starks in particular tend to produce men inclined to direct action and not sly intrigue, Lord Eddard Stark was hopelessly out of his depth in the snakepit that was King's Landing and found himself outmaneuvered by rivals and falsely executed by the Lannister King. His firstborn son Robb Stark aka The Young Wolf is currently leading resistance to that King and has formally seceded from the Seven Kingdoms, crowning himself King in the North. He has also allied with his mother's people, the Tullys. Robb Stark is proving to be a surprisingly significant hindrance to Twyin Lannister, the head of House Lannister and the power behind the throne. 
It is difficult to invade and virtually impossible to hold The North. The last person to do it (Aegon Targaryen) had dragons. Even then King Torrhen Stark considered trying to kill the dragons while they slept and continue the fight against the Targaryens before deciding he couldn't risk his people's destruction. The Stark sigil is a gray direwolf on a white field. Their enigmatic words are "Winter is Coming" . The words refer both to the Long Night and the constant struggle against the elements. As was shown when Robb Stark's wolf Grey Wind bit off the fingers of the GreatJon for questioning Robb's orders and right to lead, men of The North respect strength. No Stark will ever ask followers to do something he won't do himself.







House Lannister

House Lannister is the richest and most powerful House of Westeros. It controls the westernmost portion, unsurprisingly known as the Westerlands. This region has a tremendous amount of natural resources, primarily gold mines. House Lannister's investments and wealth have grown over the centuries. House Lannister rules from its capital of Casterly Rock. Lannisters are descended primarily from the Andal invaders. Their House founder was a trickster who conned the original owners out of Casterly Rock. The Lannister King Loren joined with the King of the Reach to oppose the Targaryen invasion. Fortuitously surviving the incineration of four thousand men, King Loren bent the knee to Aegon Targaryen and became one of his greatest servants.

It's neither widely known nor openly acknowledged but Joffrey Baratheon is really Joffrey Lannister. Cersei Lannister and Jaime Lannister committed incest, adultery and treason in cuckolding Robert Baratheon, a man whom Cersei Lannister loathed, in part because of physical abuse and philandering but mostly because he never loved her the way he loved Lyanna Stark.

Although Joffrey is King, the real power in House Lannister and thus in Westeros, is Tywin Lannister, Joffrey's grandfather, Hand, and the land's most ruthless, pragmatic and calculating warlord. Tywin has the total loyalty of some very vicious troops and is wealthy enough to buy many more monsters. It's unclear as to whether Tywin knows of the incest or knew of Cersei's plan to murder Robert Baratheon but it's a certainty that Tywin would permit no one else to judge his children.

Tywin's ruthlessness started decades ago. His father Tytos was a weak lord. Tytos Lannister lavished time on his lowborn mistress, giving her Tywin's late mother's dresses, jewels and finery. Lannister debtors didn't pay their bills. Lannister bannermen regularly disrespected Tytos. Finally, two Lannister vassals openly revolted. But it was the young Tywin who handled the revolt. He put down the revolt by the simple expedient of exterminating all the members of the rebellious Houses-men, women and children. Root and stem. Everyone. These acts made Tywin a dreaded man. After Tytos' death, Tywin had his father's mistress stripped and marched through the streets. House Lannister regained respect. Tywin intends that House Lannister's power continue after he dies. People laughed at his father. No one ever laughs at him. Tywin himself rarely smiles or laughs. Unlike his grandson Joffrey, Tywin seldom enjoys cruelty for its own sake but considers it a tool. Intentions don't matter to Tywin. Results count. He has low tolerance for flatterers or fools. And unlike the late Eddard Stark, Tywin Lannister has no concern for smallfolk. 

Tywin had been former Hand to the Mad King Aerys but resigned after escalating tensions. Aerys was jealous that Tywin was getting more credit for successful administration than he was (and ripped out the tongue of a Lannister soldier unwise enough to publicly say that) while Tywin was deeply suspicious of Aerys' lustful designs on his wife, Joanna, and humiliated at Aerys' insulting rejection of Tywin's suggestion of a Targaryen-Lannister marriage involving Jaime or Cersei Lannister. During the rebellion the Lannisters stayed neutral until the very end, when they pretended to come to Aerys' aid but sacked the city, and murdered the king, his daughter-in-law (Elia Martell), and young grandchildren. Tywin had the Targaryen corpses wrapped in Lannister cloaks and presented to the new king Robert, as proof of his fidelity. His reward for this atrocity was to become Robert's father-in-law.

Tywin strongly dislikes, really more hates, his dwarfish son Tyrion (whose birth killed his mother)  but his children share many of his traits. Cersei has his cruelty and arrogance. Jaime has his military skill and fearlessness. Tyrion has his cunning, leadership capacity and ability to quickly read people. All three have his pride. The Lannister words are "Hear me roar" but they rarely use those, preferring instead the unofficial motto of "A Lannister always pays his debts". This is occasionally used as a reassurance and boast of wealth and rectitude but much more often stated as a barely veiled threat. As Season Three opens, the Lannisters have allied with the Tyrells to defeat Stannis Baratheon but are still involved in an epic struggle with the Starks and Tullys. House Lannister is also said to be hated by Dorne and House Martell because of the rape and murder of Elia Martell. 

Movie Reviews-The Man with the Iron Fists, Standoff

The Man With The Iron Fists
directed by RZA

Dave Bautista is a HUGE MONSTER of a man. Lucy Liu and Jamie Chung are sexy. RZA is not a skilled actor. Russell Crowe could stand to drop a few pounds. Those are the impressions I got from watching this film. They are pretty much about all I remember. Look, nobody goes to watch a kung-fu/action movie for the great acting or complex plot lines. That's certainly not what I enjoyed watching those Saturday afternoon channel 4 kung-fu movies all those years ago.  So I wasn't really expecting much from this film. And I wasn't disappointed.

RZA directed this film with an assist in production and writing by Quentin Tarantino and Eli Roth ("Hostel"). As a director he's so so but then again most people don't hit a home run at their first at bat. No the major problem here is that RZA can't really act. Or to be more charitable he can't act well enough for you to suspend belief that he's not RZA and instead is the titular character, an emancipated slave, who somehow got shipwrecked halfway across the world in 19th century China, where he works as a blacksmith (and undercover monk) making weapons for various rival gangs who fight each other for, well, they don't really need a reason and you don't either.

Blacksmith doesn't speak much in the film but does give a lot of the voice over. He has a thing going on with the delectable Lady Silk (Jamie Chung) a prostitute in the brothel run by the older, still sexy and proto-feminist Madam Blossom (Lucy Liu), a woman who promises her female employees that the day of their liberation is arriving soon. Blacksmith intends to earn enough money to purchase the freedom of Lady Silk. Until then they only see each other. Lady Silk is unavailable to any other customers, no matter what they offer.

As mentioned there are many rivals gangs or clans that battle for supremacy. During one such fight between the Lions and the Hyenas, Gold Lion, an honorable elder, is betrayed by his subordinates Silver Lion and Bronze Lion, and murdered. The duo intend to steal a gold shipment that they were supposed to be protecting. One of their top enforcers is Brass Body (Dave Bautista) who can turn his body to the aforementioned metal. When Gold Lion's son The X-Blade (Rick Yune) hears of his father's traitorous murder of course he swears bloody revenge and runs out looking for the scumbags who did it. Meanwhile a British mercenary named Jack Knife (Russell Crowe) shows up in town looking for the gold and women, not necessarily in that order. All of these people wind up in Jungle Village and the sparks such as they are start to fly.

In case you can't tell I wasn't super impressed by this movie. There are several scenes which are not only homages to kung-fu movies but there are seemingly virtual  shot for shot takes of some classic Tarantino scenes from Kill Bill. So if you like being able to watch a movie and pick out influences or shots from other films this could be an interesting exercise. I would have been furious if I had paid for this in the theater. It just didn't have enough energy to work even as a bad kung fu movie. This phrase is almost a cliche now but RZA's performance is wooden. Even when he gets his chance to go on a roaring rampage of revenge you just don't feel very much for the character. He seems bored. Many performances seem muted here, with the exception of Bautista who just needs to flex and beat people up and Liu, who infuses what could have been a dragon lady stereotype with humor and surprising physicality. This is an ok late night movie if there is nothing else on to watch but it doesn't rank with the classics of the genre.
TRAILER




Stand Off
written by Terry George

The first issue I had with this film was actually referenced by the film itself. People in America and the UK and Ireland may technically speak the same language but there are occasions when the accent, cadence and slang may render words, phrases or even entire sentences temporarily incomprehensible. A Belfast man asks an American a question which the American simply can't understand, even when the Belfast man repeats himself. Frustrated the Belfast man inquires "Do they not speak English over there in America?"

Just like with the American it took some time for me to catch on to the accents and what was really going on. Once I did, well the movie was okay but it was nothing to write home about. An American, Joe Maguire (Brendan Fraser) who has familial (and possibly criminal ties) to Northern Ireland, comes to Belfast to run an antique shop for his cousin, who is either off on vacation or doing good deeds in Africa. Maguire does his best to fit in and even starts to make goo-goo eyes at beautiful Ethiopian immigrant Sophie (Yaya DaCosta).

Meanwhile local crime overlord Mad Dog Flynn (David O'Hara) (and there are more than a few setpieces used to show that he really does indeed deserve his sobriquet) is tired of his wife nagging him about his inability to get her pregnant. In fact he won't even admit that he's the party with the parts that don't work and will throw a beating to anyone who suggests so. Flynn has noticed that one of his local loanshark/gambling debtors Jimbo (Martin McCann) has a young son. So desirous of a peaceful situation with his wife, Flynn tells Jimbo that as he can't pay his debt that Jimbo will need to hand over his son to Flynn. If Jimbo refuses Flynn will just kill Jimbo and his wife and take the baby anyway.

Desperate and not knowing what else to do Jimbo decides to rob the local fish market to get enough money to either pay Flynn or more likely get out of town. But the fish market is owned by Flynn. The robbery doesn't work as planned and through a series of comical and not so comical mixups Jimbo winds up in the antique shop with Joe and Sophie as hostages. Unfortunately for Joe the local police, led by detective Weller (Colm Meaney) believe that Joe is the armed robber and hostage taker. Weller also has some family issues he's working thru with his son. Weller is the old school sort of policeman who wants to beat up criminals and arrest them instead of spending time doing what he sees as "social work".

Of course there are some funny kids with hearts of gold and hidden links between many of the parties involved in this situation. This was an ok little film with great location shots of Belfast. But good or great movie? Ehh. Meaney and O'Hara do a solid job carrying this film but they just don't have enough to work with. A Snatch or Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels this was not. It is nowhere near as action packed as the trailer would have you believe.
TRAILER